and wild plum trees in tremulous white

@Coelacanth <3 and also @Sunny, if you so desire. Otherwise, we will just assume that he's there in the background with Dawn.

Grayday didn't know much about plants, and now that he couldn't see them, he knew even less. "I don't know, princess," he said for what felt like the millionth time, answering yet another of Dawn's questions about the surrounding flora. "Just don't put it in your mouth."

That was the only advice he could give her about most of this stuff. Occassionally, they would come across a plant he could identify by scent alone, but he was rarely familiar enough with it to say more than eat it or don't eat it.

Dawn was getting a little fed up with all this, but she heeded his words with little more than a frustrated huff before traipsing off to find another plant to bother him with.

Grayday settled his head back on his paws and began to doze off again. He was beginning to trust his children more and more to explore on their own, though he'd told them very firmly to stay within hearing range. Dawn's steps were easy to detect, as she crashed through the woods like a rutting moose, but he had to strain his ears a bit more to detect Sunny's quiet steps.

EVENT LOG
February 16, 2017: Seelie loses Julep, Isengrim, and Moorhen.
February 16, 2017: Sad!Seelie is reunited with Komodo just before midnight.
February 17, 2017: Seelie and Komodo meet Hemlock the next morning.
February 26, 2017: Seelie visits Olive for some soul-healing time.

In Seelie’s personal timeline, this thread takes place just a few hours before she gets puppynapped by Blackfeather Woods and is her last happy thread for a long time.

Things were looking grim for Coelacanth.

Julep, Isengrim, and Moorhen were gone — but the reappearance of the Angakkuq in little Big Ears’ life had bolstered her spirits, somewhat. Her friendship with the mist-shrouded druid and a burgeoning respect for the fire-furred Hemlock helped to ground and center her. Guilt lingered, but it always would — it seemed she was forever subtracting instead of adding, and it ate away at her. Still, Seelie remembered now to look at the stars when she wanted to hear her grandmother’s songs and stories, to wade in the ocean shallows when she wanted to feel her father’s embrace, and to comb the shoreline from the sea lions’ shoals to the glassy river deltas when the tide went out and she felt Amoxtli’s lack most keenly. Greedy as any magpie, the sprightly sheepdog had begun her own collection of trinkets and treasure in her twin’s memory, and she’d have been lying if she denied that part of her obsessive hoarding was a desire to feel emotionally close to him despite the undeniable, uncharted distance that lay inexorably between them — and a superstitious whim that by doing so, she could lure him back to her. Lure all of them back to her.

Today the inkdark ingénue was on official business: replenishing the herb stores she had inherited from Doe. Treating Olive and Dakarai’s extensive wounds had depleted Seelie’s modest supply of yarrow, celandine, and sphagnum moss, and the promise of wildberries still heavy with ice wine lured her further and further inland. She continued fulfilling responsibilities and obeying commands given by no wolf in the hopes that the Cairn children or their parents would return to her, but she was losing hope.

Despite this, there was a lively, if mildly incongruous, staccato snap to the sheepdog’s flowing legato steps as she returned to the lush little thicket she remembered so well — and her fox-fine nose snuffled intently through a wall of foliage that just about blocked the larger male and his two frolicking cubs from view. It was something akin to catching glimpses of other library patrons whilst browsing a bookshelf, and Seelie, torn between revealing herself and turning tail to escape the situation, lingered just a little too long before she emerged from her pocket of leaf-latticed shadow and presented herself for the thickly-furred wolf’s perusal. Her ink-feathered tail swept low and fluttered appealingly betwixt her hocks to complement her naturally submissive carriage as her tufted ears folded with the delicacy of an origami lotus, Neptune eyes tracing him with a look both bashful and bold before she looked demurely down at her forepaws.

It was a pity - a shame, a crime - that the male's eyes should have failed him already, before giving him the chance to look on the delicate creature before him. She was everything that attracted him - dark and lithe. Exotic and graceful. Slight and sweet-tempered. In the moments before his mind caught up with him, she was all of them. Amber, Akuti, and even the dark stranger that'd fled his presence so many moons ago. (If he'd know that her name was 'Asterr', he would have laughed at his own predictability. Dark pelts, bright eyes, and even names that start with 'A', made all the more common by Adeline, who was notably different than what he'd come to consider his 'type'.)

But by the shape of her, and by the strange, breezy scent, he knew that she was none of them.

For a moment, he simply stared at the strange apparition, his nostrils flaring as he took in what his nose could tell him. She did not smell lonely, but whatever fellows she had, she'd left them far behind. Grayday considered her a moment longer before allowing his tail to thump the ground. He remained resting in his sphinx-like sprawl, not wanting to startle what he took to be a very flighty creature.

oh no here we go o///o lets have a bit of sunny cuteness!

 

Sunny had caught a mouse! He had caught one all by himself! It had been nibbling on berries beneath a bush both he and Dawn had found, and without hesitation Sunny had agiley leapt upon it's small furry back and killed it with a clean bit the the back, severing its spine from it's head. Carrying it back with loud and eager leaps through the bushes he ran into view of Grayday "Daddy look! Look what i caught!" his shouted were loud as hell, disturbing probably every piece of good sized prey within range.


Skidding to a halt beside Gray, his eyes fell upon the pretty, dark figure of the sheepdog (though he thought she was a odd looking wolf). "Hello miss" he chirped with a wag of his tail before walking into Grayday's sights, only a few inches from his eyes. He knew daddy had issues with his eyes, but not how bad it had gotten. He dropped the mouse onto his father's paws and nearly exploded with pride "Daddy i got a mouse! It was eatin some berries and i just pounced on it!" he babbled quickly.Now that he had told his father the impressive news, he turned to the woman and bowed his head unsure of who she was. For all he knew she could be like Uncle steady and Valette, an Alpha which meant he had to show respect.

This post is clunky. ;-; ♥

Coelacanth did not completely quail under the male’s investigative stare, but her Neptune eyes danced away from his with practiced elusiveness. The heavy thump-thump-thump of his tail reassured her, and she danced a shy step closer when he did not rise, a whispery whine of greeting winging from her lips. Her dainty, tapered muzzle quivered timorously as she leaned forward on her tiptoes to drink in his scent — the spice of cedar tempered by the cool heaviness of rain-dappled earth. His nonchalant manner and benign mien captivated her, lulling the hypersensitive fight or flight response that typically governed her every interaction, and her tufted ears fanned hesitantly forward as one catlike paw ghosted just a breath nearer. Delicate nostrils flared and ink-feathered hackles stiffened in a soft shimmer along her spine, but aside from a nervous whuff that bore the warm, sweet scent of overripe berries, she was utterly quiet.

For a moment, everything was.

The sudden crack and rustle of juvenile paws crashing proudly through the underbrush surprised Coelacanth, and her finely-crafted head snapped up like a startled filly’s as she leapt nimbly away. Curiosity kept her well within the trio’s range, and although a tremor rocked her and continued to hum almost palpably through her lithe musculature, she greeted the cheerful child as bravely as she could. He was different from Isengrim — less scrappy, more accepting — and she dipped her muzzle in return, regarding his triumph with a doggish smile. Slim jaws parted as her tongue poked pertly between her lower canines, and her sumi-e brush tail flickered and snapped like a blithe black silk streamer behind her.

Grayday continued to peer in the woman's direction, mystified by her sudden appearance and then again by her solemn silence. He half-rose to his paws before Sunny crashed into the clearing, and the male was both resentful and glad as his son's youthful face was forced to the forefront of his vision.

"Nice job, buck-o," he praised, nosing the kill back toward his son. "Eat up - to the victor go the spoils."

His eyes left his son's face and fixed themselves back on the stranger. It felt wrong to speak aloud to the woman when she'd, thus far, been entirely silent, but if figured that he could certainly speak to her, if Sunny felt comfortable doing so.

"Evening, miss," he offered, resisting the urge to hold his breath as he waited for a response. He had to lock his legs in order to persuade himself that it was not necessary to walk toward her. I really need to figure this out, he thought to himself, looking once again toward his son in order to quell the wanting mood that women always brought out of him, these days. After a moment, he convinced his legs to fold underneath him, and he sat down where he'd laid a moment before.

Sunny grinned from ear to ear his tail wagging behind him rapidly. Before he took a bite of the mouse he looked toward the female. He sniffed at her scent and found he could smell others, younger wolves at that. His belly grumbling he poked at the mouse for a second before picking it up in his jaws and slowly approaching the dark sheepdog. when he was in front of her he dropped to his belly, and flattened his ears showing that he meant no harm. Dropping the mouse at her paws he whispered "For the babies. I can smell them on you" he said quiet enough for it to be between him and her, the reason for giving his prey up not needing to be shared with his father.


Offering a warm smile he stood up and retreated to his father's side sitting down and looking at his paws nervously.

Despite Sunny’s gentler nature, Seelie treated the young wolf exactly as she had treated the Cairn children — with a healthy dose of respect bordering on servitude. Dipping her finely tapered muzzle low, she backed away carefully from his kill, tapered ears folding like sleeping grass as her Neptune gaze darted apologetically awry. It was deeply ingrained in her not to touch or take what did not belong to her, and even though Sunny had given the mouse to her, the wrongness she felt outweighed her desire to simply accept it out of politeness. In truth, she longed to nudge the prize with her nose, returning it to the boy who now sat apprehensively beside his father — but that would mean touching it. She didn’t dare.

Luminous seablue eyes flitted toward the pair as a nervous flutter danced its way down her spine and shimmied up through the length of her tail. She whuffed softly, her catlike paws shifting shyly as the older male rose partially to his paws; he was taller and older than she, and she harbored a natural inclination to submit to him. She was a little disappointed when he seemed to rethink his actions and sat down instead, a larger nesting doll to the boy who nestled at his side like a near carbon copy. A toneless, airy whine wheedled from her lips, more sigh than sound, as she tilted her head first to one side, then the other. It was an uncomfortable setup — both of them sitting across from her — that she tried immediately to assuage.

Following instinct, she sidestepped up to the grayscale patriarch, the cant of her hips low. She didn’t quite cower and her tail didn’t quite tuck, but her meaning was plain as she made to touch the tip of her quivering nose to the underside of the umber-eyed male’s jaw. Berry juice smeared her chin, but it had likely dried to the point of not leaving a purplish smear on the pale fur of his chin, cheeks, and throat.

Day felt awkward and ungainly as the dainty creature approached and touched her nose to his chin. He glanced toward his son, thinking that he would've rather met the woman on his own, rather than with Sunny there to witness his father's awkwardness around pretty women. Still, half-rising, he sniffed the stranger in turn, his nostrils flaring as he took in the many strange scents that coated the woman's pelt.

Eventually, intrigue won over anxiety. Day stood more fully, towering over the darker shewolf, and began to circle around her, taking in scents from her cheek, her sides, her underbelly, her rump. Eventually, he had come back again to her front, where he offered a doleful woof of inquiry and another aimless wag of his tail.

What's up? he wanted to ask. Why the hell are you just standing here, not talking to us?

But the curiosity was only idle. Grayday's interest waned as she contined to be silent. He found himself looking to Sunny again, waiting for something to happen.

It seemed his offering of food made the timid woman even more nervous, and so after the shadowy figure had shied away and flattened her ears sunny crept forward and took the mouse back "not what you like?" he joked lightly before scooting away again. It seemed neither him nor his father knew what to do with this pretty and silent woman, but it only made Sunny more curious.


Watching as the dark furred woman moved toward his father, and touched her nose to the underside of his chin he understood the gesture as one of respect. His attentions strayed for a moment as he heard a rustling in the bushesbut when he looked back Grayday was sniffing the silent woman. piping up with a softly uttered question "can you speak miss?"

The little stray drew a breath so deep her concave sides fluttered at its apex; she spent it on a flurry of soft, snuffling whuffs, timorously investigating the stranger in turn. Her finely tapered muzzle tipped upward as her posture curved to reflect Grayday’s — he arched over her, and she flowed like a tilde to meet him, gleaning what information she could. She took his cursory evaluation as a token of his acceptance and warmed accordingly, dancing lightly toward his son with a playful tilt of her head. “Not what you like?” he’d asked her, his tone light and innocuous. She had no personal aversion to mice, but she had no clear way of conveying this; nevertheless, she tried her best. Tufted ears perked atop her head like two upside-down exclamation points as she tipped her head entreatingly to the side and stretched out one catlike paw, waggling it indolently: her equivalent of classifying something as so-so. Mice were nice — just small.

His next question was both easier to answer and harder to admit: simply, she shook her delicate head and allowed her ink-plumed tail to sketch a scribbled apology that she could give no voice to.

The woman was too lithe and quick to keep track of. She reminded Grayday of a little black bird, fluttering around on sharp little wings made out of little hollow bones. The motion was almost dizzying to track, and so Grayday sank down once more, letting his eyes fall shut. He doubted the woman would cause his son any trouble, and even if she did, he could almost see Sunny taking her on.

We should probably close this up, soon XD

A sudden tug of recollection pulled at the sheepdog; she needed to return to the coast to check the shoreline for her lambs. Dancing a hip-swiveling, sidestepping circle around the two grayscale wolves, she filled her bowl with the herbs she knew: yarrow, celandine, poppy, and raspberry leaves. She plucked delicately the roundest, ripest berries she could espy, leaving a good amount still growing on the boughs, and placed them in a bowl of stiffened hide. Then she made to nuzzle softly at each pewter-furred chin and briskly turned for home.